I’m back! Wait… where’s anaaga? She’s under the weather, so it looks like it’ll be just me after a week of just her. Hopefully we’ll reunite next week!

Onto this week’s episode. This is the start of another 2-episode arc.

After a little bit of Shogi playing, Natsume and his bros hit the town for some corn on the cob. I like corn, but that doesn’t apply to this episode. Natsume walks across a youkai who is passing out fliers. A fellow youkai approaches and they both try to kidnap Natsume, but his bros are able to find him and the youkai guys leave.

Natsume arrives home a little later, and as he goes to close the window in his bedroom, a jar is thrown in from outside. Natsume goes to grab the jar and is surprised his hand went through it, only a little bit later to being sucked in the jar and in chibi form. Nyanko-sensei tries to open/break the jar, but it won’t break. Nyanko seems to know that only the owner can open the jar and also that the inside of the jar is a part of the youkai world, so Natsume cannot be seen by the common human eye.

Without much time to go find the owner, Nyanko pulls out his shapeshifting ability and turns himself into Natsume, or as I will call him, Nyatsume. The look is almost identical, but the mannerisms need a little working on. Touko calls him (Natsume) down for dinner, so Nyatsume gets to enjoy a nice big meal in his place and is probably planning to get that beer sometime later. Natsume has to coach Nyatsume on how to be polite at the dinner table.

When did Natsume become such a poser?

Sleeping in a bottle must be weird. As Natsume is sleeping, the same youkai he met at the festival come into his room and try to take the jar, but Nyanko was waiting for them to come and scares them off. Natsume mentions Omibashira-sama and the possible connection it has to helping him out. He suggests to Nyanko that they ask Nishimura at school about it the next day.

Nyatsume’s pretty impatient with Natsume’s buddies. It eventually leads to him dragging Sasada out of class and a mention that she smells delicious. Hard to gauge for sure since it’s a cat saying so, but she does seem sweet. I’m guessing she smells like… Anyways, as Natsume and Nyatsume talk about what they know so far, Tanuma finds them and starts talking to Nyatsume. Tanuma’s pretty sure that isn’t Natsume he’s actually talking to, so Nyanko decides to just go neko form and tell him like it is.

As it always is with Natsume, he’d rather not have his friends get involved. Since Tanuma can’t hear his plea or probably wouldn’t care anyway, he decides to help out. Nyanko spots one of the youkai hiding in a bush and goes after him while Tanuma stands out in the open. A second youkai comes from behind, gives him a little choppy-chop attack and steals Natsume. Running to find Natsume, Tanuma comes across a building and can vaguely see youkai walking up the steps as another youkai stands right behind him.

Nyatsume Yuujinchou:

Nishimura… out of the gutter, bro

Damn I’m sexy!

Tanuma, this is just any ordinary jar. You see nothing in it. But if I open it up…

AHHHHH!! Get me out of here!

This whole episode made me wonder why there isn’t a Natsume action figure/statue. If there is, I’d get one of him or Nyanko-sensei.

You usually don’t see the comedy beat played throughout a whole episode of Natsume as it did here. It was really funny to see Nyatsume go through life in human form, not really doing a good job of pretending to be a guy that he’s spent so much time with, probably more than any other human or even youkai. The posing, the way he talked to Touko and the interactions/frustration he had walking around school, all just hilarious; and another voice for Inoue Kazuhiko on top of Nyanko and Madara. Natsume’s frequent facepalm-esque reactions made Nyatsume all the more enjoyable. Natsume’s reputation is taking a weird hit with his school pals. How do you explain away “you smell delicious” and what looked like was gonna be a proposal? Poor Sasada… Natsume, let her down gently when you get back to normal.

I really enjoy when Tanuma’s around, regardless of Natsume’s growing fear for people getting close to him. Season 3 was key for his character growth and now he’s much more aware of what Natsume goes through in his day-to-day and is sharp enough to know when someone, like Nyanko-sensei, is impersonating him. If Tanuma could see the youkai that well going up the steps, either his spiritual power has seen a bit of an increase or it’s just that this is our first time seeing him view youkai in a well-lit area. Either way, it’ll be interesting to see how things play out with him and Nyanko-sensei trying to save Natsume.

Other things of interest: Natsume’s school buddies aren’t the sharpest knives in the drawer, but at least Sasada knew something. Onizaru and his youkai partner, can’t speak too much on them until we see their full intentions next episode. And it looks like Nyatsume and Taki will cross paths next week, and I’d really like to see that since it could be a strange and kind of funny encounter.

THIS. EPISODE. I was like Hime, LOLing throughout the episode. You don’t get this kind of humour that often in Natsume.

I like Tanuma A LOT and I was going ‘behind you!’ when Onizura appeared. Man, I wish he could see youkai like Natsume. Our kid definitely needs a nakama/sidekick for such dangerous situations because Nyanko-sensei’s always out drinking sake. /jk

This episode was one pure, big LOL. It’s also quite clever comedy to make Natsume act copletely out of character, being the witness of such behaviour himself (I’m gonna put Kamiyan scream as a ringtone one day. It always crack me up.)
I love Tanuma ^_________^ He’s a real friend And the next episode seems to have some BL undertones, yay

This episode was hilarious XD and has easily become one of my top 5 favorite Natsume episodes. It’s was funny watching Nyanko-sensei act like Natsume. He didn’t even bother to try unless Natsume was yelling at him.

I really hope Tanuma’s spiritual powers are increasing and he starts showing up to help Natsume more. He’s one of my favorite characters and Natsume’s closest friend.

There was a figure of Natsume released back in 2010. There’s more figures too if you look on that site.
But about the episode, the Nyatsume scenes were so embarrassing to watch. xD
I loved this arc so I can’t wait to see the 2nd half animated next week.